Shred

You make light work of my skin,
Strip it from my body,
Like there's a zipper in my skull,
All my sinful blood and flesh and
Guts and everything on show.

Excoriate me. Rip me up.
Make me tiny wretched shreds.
Claw my awful sinews from my bones.
I'm base meat to be butchered,
Till there's no human left.

No weapons, you use your teeth
To tear me limb from limb.
Grind and grind and grind and grind,
You pulverise me, punish me,
And leave me nothing at all.

Cross roads

Not trusting them
Not to pull out
Even when the signal's good
I run
Because
That's not how I want to go

Shrinking

I think I'm shrinking,
Melting and fading, and soon
Nothing will be left

Zoo

Inert, they lie
Neither sleeping
Nor waking
Neither dying
Nor living
In the greasy
English sun
Truncated
By their cages
Gazing emptily
Through half lidded
Limpid amber eyes
At the melee
Inured to
The shrieks
Of the wildlife
Around them
Robbed of their
Magic, won
Over centuries
In distant
Desert lands
Once glorious
Now lifeless
Once proud
Made mute
And revealed
To an eye
Without wonder
Once thrilled
Now saddened
To find
The wretched truth

To her mother's mind

A little short one, musing on the headlines lately about the horrifying prevalence of rape culture.

To her mother's mind
Any dress that isn't
A voluminous sack
Is an anti-feminist dress
That night then
As she'd understand it
Was an anti-feminist nightmare
To most men's minds
Any dress that isn't
A voluminous sack
Is an invitation
That night then
As they'd understand it
She was asking for it

Heart

I will scoop out my
heart and give it to you as
an eternal gift